Appeal from
INSEC to all well wishers and friends
After six months
of the imposition of the state of emergency on November last year,
politics in this Himalayan kingdom switched to a high voltage
political drama culminating the dissolution of the 205 member House
of Representatives by Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba on May 22
midnight and thereby fixing the date of mid term polls on November
13.
The nation
shattering move of Premier Deuba was caused chiefly because of the
long standing feud between the two factions within the ruling Nepali
Congress led by Deuba and Congress president Girija Prasad Koirala
when the latter denied to support the proposal of Prime Minister to
extend the state of emergency for another six months.
Both Deuba and
Girija turned out to be equally vocal while labeling each other
with hardest possible blames and defending their own arguments. The
former defended that the dissolution was caused by the hindrance of
his own party against his effort to bail out the nation from the
terrorists while the latter charged the former for being a pawn of
the reactionaries in a bid of rooting out democracy from the nation.
When Deuba
returned from his visit of the United States and United Kingdom on
May 15, he had categorically denied the extension of the emergency
while talking to reporters in the Tribhuvan International
Airport.
Most of the
political parties were also demanding the end of the emergency as
soon as possible. A kind of atmosphere was developed that the
public was sure that the emergency would not be extended.
All of a sudden,
the government in an all party meeting held on May 17 sought six
months extension of the emergency. As a surprise turn of events,
the all party meeting was also attended by Chief of the Army Staff
General Prajjwall Sumser JB Rana, Chief of Nepal Police Pradip
Sumser JB Rana and Chief of the Armed Police Force Krishna Mohan
Shrestha who expressed their intention in the meeting that the
extension of the state of emergency would help them containing the
terrorists. Then, the government registered a proposal in the
parliament for the extension of the state of emergency for another
six months.
Meanwhile, Central Working Committee of ruling
Nepali Congress passed a proposal to direct the Prime Minister to
withdraw the proposal of the state of emergency from the parliament.
The party also issued a letter to Prime Minister Deuba seeking
clarification from him within 24 hours why he had not consulted the
party before seeking emergency extension.
Premier Deuba who came down heavily against the
Party’s move in the CWC meeting went straight to the Royal Palace
after the party meeting and thereby submitted the recommendation for
the dissolution of the House of Representative even without giving a
smallest hint to his close confidantes.
Three ministers including the Finance Minister
Ram Sharan Mahat, Minister for Youth Sports and Tourism Amod Prasad
Upadhyay and Minister for Women and Social Welfare Rajendra Kharel
resigned from their posts in protest of Deuba move alleging that he
did not trusted them for not giving a hint of the dissolution of the
parliament.
Buoyed by the unexpected dissolution of the
Parliament Deuba, Congress President GP Koirala suspended the Deuba
from primary membership of the party and also asked to furnish
explanations within three days regarding his dissolution of the
House of Representatives and call for the November 13 fresh polls.
Even as Deuba furnished the clarifications, the furious Koirala
expelled Deuba from the primary membership of the party for three
years.
After these all developments, the ruling Nepali
Congress is in the verse of separation. Influential Congress leader
Home Minister Khum Bahadur Khadka is reported to have said in a
programme, “I will be coming among the people for the elections with
the flag of Nepali Congress or any other flag.” However, several
attempts are also being made to save the party from a division.
At this juncture, the election is all set to be
accomplished on November 13. A lot of speculations are rife about
the elections. The erstwhile main opposition party, Communist Party
of Nepal Unified Marxist and Leninists CPN (UML) has officially
warned that there would be constitutional crisis if the elections
would not be held on time. Simultaneously, other speculations
including a lot of conspiracy theories are also rife about the
manner and matter of the dissolution of the Parliament. People from
some quarters also warned that reactionary forces were also playing
over the dissolution of the parliament.
Further, People talking in this line also blame
Prime Minister Deuba of being a part of the plot against democracy.
In retaliation of this allegation, Deuba has ranked Koirala equal to
the Maoist supremo Prachanda for terrorizing the country from within
the party.
Therefore, the
forth-coming elections are sure to be unprecedented and special
kinds of elections because of the above developments in Nepalese
politics. The Maoist rebels are virtually ruling many of the rural
parts of the kingdom. It seems that peaceful elections will be
difficult in about 30-35 districts.
However, in the
most populated areas that covers approximately 40 percent of the
population and many of the MPs are living, the elections seem to
less violent.
INSEC as a Human Rights watchdog wants to make
sure that people use their adult franchise in a free and fair manner
with their free consent. But the people living under poverty line,
landless people and uneducated people are vulnerable of using their
voting rights either under threat or want.
In the past elections too, INSEC has been
working its level best to educate the people about their franchise
in a bid of ensuring their free use of voting right. From 1991, we
have conducted voters’ education in every election, through our
local network organizations covering all over the kingdom.
We were leading the National Election Observation Committee (NEOC)
elected from the people’s level, leading all the human rights
community for the election observation. In the coming election also
we will educate the voters to make them capable for electing worthy
and best candidates who could safeguard democracy and Human Rights
in the country.
Therefore, we appeal all our friends and the entire human rights
community to extend solidarity as in the past so that people would
elect right candidates who cater good governance and quality
governance to breed up the young democracy in the country.
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